


One Name, Two Name

by SomethingFishy



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Author Doesn’t Give a Shit About Historical Accuracy, F/F, Gen, M/M, Nicknames, kink meme fill
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-25
Updated: 2020-08-25
Packaged: 2021-03-06 14:22:01
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26100334
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SomethingFishy/pseuds/SomethingFishy
Summary: Every nickname given and received has some sort of story behind it.
Relationships: Andy | Andromache of Scythia/Quyhn | Noriko, Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 11
Kudos: 195





	One Name, Two Name

**Author's Note:**

> Old Guard Kink Meme request of “ Give me all the terms of endearment (in every language imaginable) that these two have come up with over a millennium.
> 
> Bonus points: they also have different fond nicknames for the rest of the team.” 
> 
> But I mostly focused on the team thing WHOOPS. 
> 
> I’m so rusty y’all

It’s six months into their time traveling together that Yusuf first started their tradition.

They were in the market of a town that Nicoló doesn’t remember the name of, hunting for oil and cheese and bread and olives, finally buying instead of stealing. What he does remember is that he looked over his shoulder, to ask Yusuf a question, only to realize he’d completely disappeared. The panic that thundered through his blood had completely caught him off guard. So he had dropped the pears he had been examining, and abandoned the fruit stall. It only lasted until he spotted Yusuf’s curls, and he found his companion crouched at the mouth of an alley, talking with a child. 

She had dirty cheeks and messy hair, her huge brown eyes looking at Yusuf gratefully as he handed her a coin. Then she had looked up to where Nicoló was standing and innocently asked, “who’s that?”

Yusuf glanced over his shoulder, smiled that warm sunshine smile off his and ruffled her hair as he stood saying, “ _ ya amar.” _

Nicoló felt his face grow hot, and rolled his eyes, which just seemed to amuse Yusuf even more. As they rejoined to continue walking through the market, if he stood a little closer, neither of them mentioned it. 

As they travelled and the languages changed so smoothly around them, the nickname stuck, gifted to Nicoló long before  _ habibi _ but staying long after whatever “my breath” was. He also tried his hand with creative nicknames for Yusuf, but they never seemed to fit him as well as the simple ones.  _ Bello  _ and  _ caro _ and  _ amore  _ just fell from his lips so easily.

When they finally met Andromache and Quynh, it was actually Nicoló who spread on the nickname tradition. Privately, in conversations with Yusuf, he’d been calling Quynh  _ falco _ for weeks before he slipped up around the campfire. In his defense, everyone had been a little drunk, and they were all sprawled across each other, warm and content. Then, as he used his hands to illustrate the perfect shot Quynh had made to take down dinner, he said, “-and thunk! Right in the heart!  _ Nosotro piccolo falco  _ strikes again!”

He could feel Yusuf’s rumbling laughter under his head, but also felt how Quynh had gone still. For a split second, he wondered if he just fucked up- insulted them both- but instead when he looked to confirm it, he just saw their confused faces blinking at him.

“ _ Piccolo falco?” _ Quynh asked, lifting her head from where she had been resting it on his thigh. 

“Yes?” He didn’t mean for it to come out as a question. He flicked his wrist back and forth, trying to grasp the translation. “Ah, little hawk, it means.”

“I know,” she smiled. “I’ve just never been called that before.” She dropped her head back to his thigh, and carded her fingers through Andromache’s hair. “ _ Ilie mou _ or  _ kardia mou _ , yes, but  _ falco _ ? That one is new.”

“I think it fits,” Andromache said, sounding pleased. 

Something warm bloomed in Nicoló’s chest, as he twisted his head to look at Yusuf, reaching up to poke his cheek gently. “See, not all of my nicknames are embarrassing.” 

That set them all off to laughing again, ringing brightly in the night air. After that, everything melted into warm richness, highlighted by the flickering of the campfire and the way Yusuf wrapped his arm around Nicoló’s chest and held him close. 

Andromache was just as much of a nicknamer as Yusuf was, Nicoló discovered with delight after the drunken night. The only way it differed was that, unless it was to Quynh, she had one nickname picked and that was all she used for Yusuf and him. Yusuf became  _ adelfouli  _ and he became  _ Nickolakis _ . She never explained why she held back until he slipped, but he secretly believed that she didn’t want to embarrass them or cause them alarm with her warm affection, since she came off as extremely aloof. But she always seemed so proud, when she would shout  _ Nickolakis _ ! just to see his head swivel in her direction. 

After they lost Quynh, though, her nicknames died along with half of her soul. 

It was a long, long time before they had another person to affectionately label, and both Nicoló and Yusuf jumped at the chance. Sebastien came into their lives on a cold wind and was welcomed lovingly with no label for a solid year before Nicky finally remembered his name.

“Hey, Sebastien? Doesn’t your last name translate to just... the book?” Nicky had asked one night, as they sat around the table and ate. 

Sabastien nodded, hurriedly chewing before saying, “yes. My father insisted that we got it because long ago, one of my ancestors was a monk. Someone who translated the Bible, or something like that.” He pushed a potato around his plate with his fork, “guess that doesn’t really matter now, though.” 

“Of course it does. It’s your name,” Nicky shrugged, then let a little humor bleed into his tone. “But your ancestor... he couldn’t have chosen a little better?”

A soft smile spread across Sebastien’s lips, the first one they’d seen in weeks. “I wish he had, sometimes.”

Joseph chuckled a little, his own grin starting to make his face glow. “Maybe that’s all he could think of. Like a guard went-“ he held up his butter knife to Sebastian, brandishing it at his nose, making his voice a little rougher. “‘ _ What’s your name?! _ ’ And your ancestor goes ‘Fredrick!’ And the guard goes, ‘ _ Fredrick what?!’  _ And your ancestor looks around and just goes ‘the book, sir! Fredrick the book!’”

The table tried to muffle their amusement at Joseph's antics as he put down his butter knife. 

Sebastien was bright eyed, grinning as he said, “it was actually probably Charles, that nervous fuck.”

Everyone burst out laughing, including Sebastien. Joseph’s shoulders were shaking, André was red faced and both Nicky and Sebastien had to lean back from the table to hold their stomachs. It was beautiful and light and even at that moment, Nicky knew he was never going to forget it. 

So, two hundred years later- which sounds like such a long time but compared to near millennia that Nicky has been alive- when their ( _ Sebas, Seb, Book) _ Booker betrayed them all it still stung so, so sharply. 

The hurt was tempered with a blessing, though, with the addition of Nile to their little family. She was refreshing and brilliant and even in the moments where the fresh wound of broken trust hurt the most she never failed to make everyone smile. 

It was during a mission that the topic of nicknames came up, because they were all bored out of their minds, sitting and waiting for their target to appear. 

“So...when did you get the nickname Andy, Andy?” Nile asked, her tone innocent and curious even through the shitty reception of their comms. 

“Oh, sometime in the 1900’s, I think,” Andy replied. Nicky could see her in his scope, crouched low in a bush in the dark. Usually she didn’t allow chatter over the comms, but tonight seemed to make for a good exception. “I went by Andrè before that, Andrea before that, so on and down forth. Same for Nicky and Joe.”

“Really?” Nile asked again, even more curious. “Just, picking names out of a hat that sounds enough like the original?”

“Pretty much,” Nicky murmured. 

Joe huffed a laugh, “shorter than Nicoló or Yusuf to shout in the battlefield or in bed.”

“ _ Boys _ ,” Andy admonished, shaking her head a little. “There is a child present.”

“I’m 26!” Nile protested, as Nicky and Joe both chimed, “yes, boss.”

Nicky swiveled his rifle a little over to the right, to catch Joe in his sights for just a moment. He was still laying stomach down on a small hill overlooking the road they were watching, but he was looking in Nicky’s direction, grinning.

Nicky swiveled back to watch the road as Joe continued, “you’ll get your true nickname soon enough, kiddo, just wait your turn.”

“Whatcha mean?” Nile asked, outrageously curious. 

“Like how Booker got his,” Nicky answered, pushing the split second of hurt down to continue, “like how I got mine, and Andy and Joe.”

“How are you gonna shorten ‘Nile’,” she asked, sounding amused. “Not much there to shorten.”

“Oh no,” Nicky said, as he spotted the headlights of the car they’d been waiting for. He waited until he could see the driver right before his crosshairs before pulling the trigger. The glass of the windshield shattered and the driver slumped forward, hole in his forehead. “I’m Joe’s  _ amar.  _ We just haven’t decided what yours is going to be yet.”

Nile laughed, as she jumped up from the bush opposite Andy, and started running towards the swerving car. “Hurry up then, we don’t have forever!”

But that, of course, was a lie, because they did. 


End file.
